The Raspberry Pi is creating quite a storm of interest. I have just got mine and one of the first things that I wanted to try was to get it talking to an Arduino over USB using Python.

.. and you know what? It proved to be a lot easier than I expected. This is mainly because, after all, despite its diminutive price tag, the Pi is just a Linux box. I got communication working both ways, with the Arduino sending 'Hello Pi' to the Pi and at the same time, testing for a digit coming in. When it receives a digit, it flashes the number of times indicated by the digit.

29 euro's for the ethernet shield on the arduino shop35$ for the raspberrie pithat doesn't make much financial difference. This way I can use the arduino for real time stuff and off-load the ethernet load and SD load to the raspberrieSounds like a good deal to me (that is except for the additional software stack - being a non Linux person)

Best regardsJantje

Do not PM me a question unless you are prepared to pay for consultancy.Nederlandse sectie - http://arduino.cc/forum/index.php/board,77.0.html -

I use Puppy linuxIt takes 72 seconds to boot to where it is connected and I am usually reading my email .Configured the way i have it it closes in less than 3 seconds.

Puppy Linux is frequently run from a 1Gig memory stick or minature SD card if you want so its bringing the total package size needed down remarkably. In that configuration it loads in about 30 seconds and can be reduced by dropping a lot of unnecessary stuff from the kernel

Squash it all in a hard drive case with a lipo battery ?

The wait to get a Pi though is ridiculous but they just started advertising it way too soon to attract interest and discourage competition I suppose . It will get done better again by someone else very soon